Running slow

[Debbie]

Nigel, I TOTALLY identify with what you're saying. I must admit that having done this base training lark for a couple of weeks now, I'm sick to the back teeth of running so slowly - and find it much harder than running at my normal 8:30-ish training pace (or quicker sometimes). Last night my partner decided to come for a run with me (a very rare occurrence! Think he's feeling guilty about letting his fitness slip!) He's an ex-rower and so subscribes to the "no pain, no gain" school of training. We ran at about 9 minute mile pace, which was fine - still able to chat - but I found it a lot harder than I would have done had I still been doing most of my running at 8-8:30 pace. I worked out that I haven't run at my "normal" pace since the Windsor half, which is now almost a month ago. I really enjoyed last night's run.

I'd decided to base train in order to safely be able to run a lot more miles to build a bit of a pre-marathon training foundation. I wasn't sure I could train 6 times a week at the kind of pace I used to on 4 times a week. But 4 times a week isn't really enough to build the kind of mileage I'm aiming at. After last night, I'm thinking of doing most of my runs at 9-9:30 "easy" pace, but allowing myself one run a week of 8:30 pace and one (short) run slightly faster than this. My fear is that if I run slowly all the time, running faster will seem a hell of a lot harder than it used to when that was my "normal" pace (if that makes sense). Certainly, after a few weeks of just plodding, running at a pace which previously felt easy actually felt quite hard.

Like everything in running, I guess it's a case of trial and error to find what works for you as an individual.